EFFECTIVE LEAN BUSINESS PLAN ASSIGNMENT

Background

21st-century entrepreneurship education and practice are dynamic and constantly evolving, with new techniques and tools being used to transform entrepreneurial opportunities to produce goods and service faster than when using traditional business planning tools and techniques.

In this assessment, we will be focusing on developing strategies for an effective lean business plan based on the fundamental concept of the lean business canvas. A lean business plan is designed to help you to learn more about your venture before expensive mistakes are made. An effective lean business plan can (Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko, 2019, p. 375):

forestall failure and show how to pivot. It is far cheaper not to begin an ill-fated business than to learn by experience much later, what your lean plan could have taught you at a cost of several hours of concentrated work.

While there is still a use for the traditional ‘long-form’ business plan, research into business planning suggests "that a traditional business plan is less important for start-ups than once thought" (Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, p. 375).

The audience for your lean business plan is potential investors. Additionally, the lean business plan will be your own analytical and reflective tool and action plan to implement your startup. You should aim to communicate ideas clearly, persuasively, and credibly to your audience. You are demonstrating how you plan to turn your idea into a business, and showing the potential growth of your business idea.

Therefore, the main task of this assessment is to develop well-thought-out and critically analysed strategies for an effective lean business plan for your next entrepreneurial venture. These should be based on a variety of relevant entrepreneurship concepts and theories as discussed in Modules 4–7 and should consider the same entrepreneurial profile dimensions or mindsets and the opportunity recognition process model as in the first assessment.

Summary

For this assessment, you must write a 3000-word report discussing strategies for an effective lean business plan. You should take ethical considerations into account, use relevant theories or concepts to support your discussion, and provide meaningful recommendations based on the strategies.

Learning outcomes

This assessment addresses the following learning outcomes:

• Examine contemporary entrepreneurship theory and practice to create insight into enterprise growth opportunities (Learning Outcome 1).
• Reflect upon, and apply contemporary entrepreneurship approaches, techniques and ethical perspectives, that develop an entrepreneur’s: leadership, mindset, capabilities and pathways to an entrepreneurial career (Learning Outcome 2).
• Evaluate the entrepreneurial venture’s external environment and internal environment factors and contexts to create, formulate, hypothesise, test, and validate evidenced-based decisions at key life cycle stages of the entrepreneurial venture (Learning Outcome 3).
• Communicate entrepreneurship knowledge, skills and ideas to others clearly, persuasively and credibly (Learning Outcome 4).

Task 

Ensure you include the below sections in your report: 

Introduction

Introduce yourself as the entrepreneur or intrapreneur, your startup and the rest of your plan. This should be 150–200 words maximum and should include:

• a brief explanation of the context, your type of venture, and the type of entrepreneur/intrapreneur. See:
  • business start-up (see Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, pages 117 and 577) as an entrepreneur, or
  • intraprise start-up (see Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, pages 58 and 574) as an intrapreneur or social intrapreneur, or
  • social business start-up (see Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, pages 71–75, and 581) as a social entrepreneur

• the scope or purpose of the venture
• the objective of discussing strategies for an effective lean business plan.

Main body

The main body of the strategies for an effective lean business plan should include the following sections and related content. When discussing strategies for an effective lean business plan, take relevant ethical considerations into account and highlight them in your discussion. It is important to note that to achieve a higher mark for this assessment, you must use a relevant theory or concept for each of the following steps where appropriate:

• The problem – Describe a practical problem the customer has and how you intend to solve the problem for the customer. You will need to provide some convincing evidence for the problem (see Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, pages 157–167).

• Customer segments – Define your potential customers. Divide your customers into segments and provide a rationale for targeting a selected segment. Briefly discuss the best customer persona for your target market (see Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, pages 267–268 and 204 and 205).

• Value proposition – What are the pain-points of the target market, the jobs to be done, and the benefits the customer will receive? (See Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, pages 167–170.)

• Solution – This is the product experience that you plan to deliver to the customer. The product experience or solution comes from the value proposition. The most successful product experiences are those that address the solution to your customer pain-points. To discuss the solution(s), briefly describe and illustrate a 'pretotype' of your product or service design for a minimum viable product (MVP) using virtual MVP techniques (see Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, pages 222–235).

• Channels – Consider which channels your customer uses so that you can acquire, sell to, and retain your customers. You will need to provide evidence for your channel selection (see Module 4 of the learning materials).

• Revenue model and pricing strategy – Briefly discuss the best possible revenue model(s) and pricing strategy(ies) for your new venture. Relevant rationales are required to justify your arguments. Please note you are not required to provide detailed calculations; some meaningful gross figures will be sufficient here (see Chapter 10 Creating Revenue Models of Neck, Neck & Murray 2018).

• Key metrics – It is always useful to get a meaningful idea about the possible revenue forecast. Create a metric in this regard with some meaningful data, and briefly explain your key metric (see Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, page 381, Figure 11.4).

• Unfair advantage – Do you have anything that cannot be imitated or bought from someone else? What resources or knowledge belongs exclusively to you? Ensure your unfair advantage links to your value proposition and your solution (see Frederick, O'Connor & Kuratko 2019, page 273).

Conclusion and recommendations

Draw a well-articulated conclusion at the end. Provide some meaningful recommendations based on the provided strategies.

References

List all references cited in the plan.

Appendices

Number each appendix (optional).

Resources

Please focus on a variety of relevant concepts and theories of entrepreneurship, as discussed in Modules 4–7. Ensure that the provided discussion is well aligned with the same entrepreneurial profile dimensions or mindsets and the opportunity recognition process model that you discussed in the first assessment.

Format

The required word length for this assessment is 3000 words (plus 10% tolerance) excluding the title page, the table of contents page, the introduction, and the reference list. Tables, figures and appendices are not included in the word count. You must focus on both theoretical and practical discussions to meet the requirements of this assessment.

It is recommended that you use the following report structure, but you can use more headings and sub-headings if you wish. Use the report template provided.  

Title page

Executive summary

Table of contents

1. Introduction
2. The problem
3. Customer segments
4. Value proposition
5. Solution
6. Channels
7. Revenue model & pricing strategy
8. Key metrics
9. Unfair advantage
10. Conclusion & recommendations

References

Appendices (if any)

Requirements

In terms of presentation and style:

• Use the AIB-preferred Microsoft Word settings (see the AIB Style Guide). All written assessments should be submitted as Word files (.docx). Word is available from your AIB Office 365 account. If you prefer to use an alternative word processor, such as Pages for Mac, ensure that you save or export the file to Word (.docx) format before submitting it.
• Acknowledge the sources of facts appropriately. Use a minimum of eight (8) academic references in addition to the textbook. Adopt the author-date style of referencing (see the AIB Style Guide). In-text references need to be used throughout your discussion where appropriate.
• All academic references must be from credible sources such as recent academic articles and books. Industry-related journals, magazines and company documents should be used on top of the required eight academic references.
• Your grade will be adversely affected if your response does not acknowledge the sources of information you have used (see Assessment Policy available on AIB website).
• To achieve a higher mark, it is highly recommended that you avoid bullet point-based discussion.

Grading criteria and feedback

Your assessment will be marked according to the following grading criteria:

1. Depth of demonstrated understanding of relevant theories and concepts in discussing the entrepreneurial context and venture type (10%)
2. Depth of demonstrated understanding of relevant theories and concepts in discussing strategies for an effective lean business plan (20%)
3. Depth of reasoning as demonstrated in critical analysis, logically developed supporting arguments and critical evaluation considering ethical perspectives (60%)
4. Referencing (5%)
5. Structure, communication style and language (5%).